


Your Mouth is a Melody

by monroeslittle



Category: Peaky Blinders (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-11
Updated: 2016-09-11
Packaged: 2018-08-14 12:31:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 19,398
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8014063
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/monroeslittle/pseuds/monroeslittle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"There was a part of her that knew it was a mistake. <i>Forget it</i>, she thought, because the past was the past, and nothing good could possibly come of dredging it back up. She was living a good, purposeful life. But she was never any good at letting the past be the past, was she? She held onto grudges, onto hope, onto <i>everything</i> with hands that grew brittle, and bloody, and bruised.</p><p>Fairytales were written to warn foolish girls like Grace."</p><p>AU. when she returns in s2, Grace isn't a rich, unhappy housewife.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Your Mouth is a Melody

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, I had to write another kind of fix-it fix. This started as my imagining how I wish Grace had returned in s2, which meant basically I wanted to fit her into the plot of s2 in a way that didn't transform her into a rich housewife whose primarily plotline was that she didn't really love her husband 'cause she was hung up on Tommy. It got kind of out of hand, 'cause that's fanfic for you. Anyway, all this to say that this fic goes AU at the start of s2.
> 
> I'm sorry that it's surely rife with typos!

_You're sunlight, smoke rings and cigarettes._  
_Outlines and kisses from silver screens._  
_Oh, dear never saw you coming._  
_Oh, my, look what you have done._

\---

Her mother had died bringing her into the world, and when she was a girl, Uncle Henry had told her that was simply the way of the world. Her mother had been so sweet, so softhearted, and “this world isn’t meant for the sweet and softhearted.” He’d touched her cheek, and told her that her mother was with the angels.

She’d disliked the angels after that, resenting them for stealing her mother from her.

\---

She was laughing in the middle of a cloud of sickly-sweet, rose-scented smoke when she saw him. For a moment, she thought she was seeing a ghost. The noise of the club became a distant, forgotten din, because the world had narrowed to him. She stared. It had been over two years, and she hadn’t seen him, spoken to him, known a thing of him, or of his life.

It wasn’t a ghost.

She was breathless at the gift of seeing him, of realizing that he was really right there in front of her.

He claimed a table with his brothers, and his smile was ready, was cold, and calculating, stopping at his eyes, and she drank in the sight of it, of him, of his hands, and his suit, and the breadth of his shoulders, traced the line of his jaw with her gaze, and the cut of his hair.

She watched a man approach him.

 _What are you getting yourself into, Tommy?_ she thought.

She knew before it happened what was going to happen, and she never blinked when they began to fight, punching, and kicking, and slicing cheeks open with the razors in their caps.

In the silence after the gun went off, his voice carried easily.

“Those of you who are downtrodden will rise up,” he said. “Yup. You know where to find us.”

They left.

She became suddenly aware of herself again, of her rolled up stockings, and the blush on her knees, of the weight of the beads that decorated her green, gauzy dress, of the company she was keeping, and the part she was playing, because she was here for a reason.

She smiled at Mr. Botetourt.

But from the corner of her eye, she saw the chaos of smashed bottles, broken chairs, and bloody men, and her heart was in her throat.

\---

There was a part of her that knew it was a mistake. _Forget it_ , she thought, because the past was the past, and nothing good could possibly come of dredging it back up. She was living a good, purposeful life. But she was never any good at letting the past be the past, was she? She held onto grudges, onto hope, onto _everything_ with hands that grew brittle, and bloody, and bruised.

Fairytales were written to warn foolish girls like Grace.

Several of her children gave her reports of the attack, and she couldn’t simply forget.

\---

She wasn’t prepared for the sight that met her when she went to the hospital. “Ready for a visitor, Mr. Shelby?” asked the nurse, and his voice was thick with annoyance in reply. She ignored him, and went in. His face was swollen, was misshapen with the blows, and he was small in the bed, small, and colorless. She approached him slowly, coming to stand by his bed.

He hadn’t yet bothered to open his eyes. “Well, what do you want?” he said. His voice was rough, exhausted.

“I really don’t know,” she said.

His eyes flew open.

She sat on the chair by his bed, crossed her legs, and she allowed him to stare.

“How did you know I was here?” he asked, swallowing.

“London’s got gossips,” she said, “and I like to have gossips for friends. That, and after I saw you in Sabini’s club, I figured it wouldn’t be long until you wound up here.” She smoothed her skirt needlessly. “It was quite a way to see you again. I almost didn’t believe it was really you at first.”

He wet his lips. “Pass me cigarettes,” he said. He pointed at his things.

She found them, and took a cigarette from the box, holding it between her lips while she lit it. She took a drag. It settled her nerves, and she stood up slightly from her chair, handing it to him.

“Sabini’s?” He inhaled, and exhaled. “I’m surprised you were in a place like that.”

“Really?” She straightened. “I live in London, and I like to dance. It seems a very likely place to find me. I’d argue you’re the one who was somewhere he shouldn’t be.” She raised her eyebrows.

His lips turned up slightly in imitation of a smile, and he looked to the ceiling.

“You don’t want to get mixed up with him, Thomas,” she told him, softer. “He’s nasty. You’re lucky he didn’t kill you.”

“Is that what you’re doing for the coppers these days?” he said. His voice gave away nothing. “Did such a good job when they had you spy on me, they’ve sent you to spy on him?”

“I’m not a copper,” she replied, “or a spy.”

“No?”

“I’m retired.”

“I see.”

“Did you think I still would be after I shot my superior?”

“I don’t know what I thought.”

“There’s a lot I never got the chance to tell you,” she said. “I joined up when I was young, and full of anger, and desperate to avenge my father. You say you aren’t political, but that’s only because you’ve never been forced to be.” She swallowed. “I found, however, that my anger at the IRA was much abated after I’d murdered a couple of the bastards. I finished my assignment, and I retired.” It was something she’d wanted to say for years. But after he’d said he’d flip a coin to decide their future, then never written again, she’d believed it was a truth she’d be trapped with forever. She hesitated. “You were never the villain in my story, Tommy.”

“What do you imagine you were in my story, Grace?”

She didn't have an answer to that.

“I assume the Inspector didn’t take your resignation very well,” he said, “and that’s why you shot him?”

“It wasn’t as much my resignation,” she said, sitting back slightly, “as it was my refusal of his proposal of marriage.” She saw the change in Tommy’s eyes, and smiled humorlessly in reply. He might have learned that she’d shot Campbell, but he hadn’t known about that. “He was stunned,” she continued. “I don’t know why; I never showed the least bit of interest in him.”

It was quiet.

“What are you doing in London, Thomas?”

“I could ask you the same.”

It was a challenge. Fine. “Have you heard the name of Botetourt?” she asked. His silence made it clear he hadn’t. “I wouldn’t have thought so, considering his business isn’t with horses, or gambling. He’s a respected, upstanding man of society, in fact, and he is also a very bad man.” She held his gaze.

“What’s he done?”

“Quite a lot. He’s a landlord. His business is legal, but his methods are cruel. He’s gained his wealth, power, and standing by taking advantage of the vulnerable, of widows, and children. The poor. That’s what I do now. I help people who need it.” She tilted her head. “What about you? Who are you helping these days?”

There was something like a smile on his face in answer.

“Grace?”

Startled, her gaze snapped from Tommy to land on Campbell.

He stood at the entrance of the wing, gaping at her. “What . . . ?” He looked at Tommy, and at her, and strangled his shock; he pursed his lips, straightened his shoulders, tightened his grip on his cane.

“Inspector,” she said. She uncrossed her ankles, shifting, and setting her feet on the floor. “Is it me you’re here for, or him?”

Campbell was silent.

“Right.” It was time for her to go. “I’ll leave the pair of you to it, shall I?” There was a part of her that didn't want to leave Tommy with Campbell when he was hurt, when he was vulnerable. It wasn’t her place to get in between them, though. She looked at Tommy. Impulsively, she bent to press a soft, careful kiss to his cheek. “It was good to see you,” she said.

He grabbed her arm when she started to move away from him.

She looked from his hand to his face in surprise, but he dropped her gaze quickly, and dropped his hand.

Campbell made a point _not_ to look at her when she passed him.

She knew that she might’ve just made things worse for Tommy by being there when Campbell arrived. She hadn’t known he'd be there, though. _I hope you know what you’re doing, Thomas_ , she thought, and when she realized she was lingering just outside the wing, she shook her head, and left.

\---

She didn’t really know if she’d become a whole different person the night she shot Campbell, or if she’d simply just become herself entirely.

He was her superior, an Inspector, and man of God, and when he’d pointed his gun at her, she hadn’t even though to plead, to run, to do anything that she should have thought to do. It hadn’t been anything close to fatal when she’d felled him, but she’d stared at him on the ground while a pool of blood grew around him, and she’d known that she needed to go. To run. She’d caught the train in a rush, trying to steady her breathing, and the tremor in her hands. If she’d stayed, she’d have been tempted to go to Tommy for help. In London, she’d called her uncle, and told him that her superior had attacked her after she’d refused his advances, and she’d shot him. Uncle Colum had never truly approved of her becoming an agent of the Crown, but he remained her uncle. He’d told her not to worry, and he was right. She didn’t know if it was his influence, or Campbell’s choice, but Campbell hadn’t pressed any charges against her.

She’d wondered for months after if she could have got away with killing him, and if she’d known she could’ve, _would_ she have?

\---

She realized as soon as one of her children told her about the peace that she was going to phone Tommy about it, but she hesitated in front of the telephone. Did she really want to do this? She didn’t owe anything to Tommy, or to his family.

She phoned him.

“Hello?”

“Thomas,” she said. She tightened her grip on the phone. “It’s Grace.”

He was silent.

“I’m sorry to phone this late,” she said, “but there’s something I thought you might want to know. Sabini’s boys have been at war with a gang of Jews for quite a while. Of course, I assume you know that, and when you declared yourself against Sabini, you were declaring for Solomons.” She paused. “I’m phoning you because I have learned that a peace was brokered just yesterday. They met, and they talked, and they aren’t at war any longer.”

“How do you know this, Grace?”

“I spend a lot of time with rather unsavory people. I have my sources. I make it a point to know what’s going on.”

Again, it was quiet.

“I’ll leave you to your business,” she told him. “Goodnight, Tommy.”

“Goodnight.”

She hung up the phone, and stared at it for a moment, feeling out of sorts at the sound of smoke in his voice, and the weight of his pauses. She needed to hurry, though. Clive was supposed to be coming to pick her up for dinner very soon.

\---

They’d been told that William was born with a weak, defective heart, and it had simply given out after years of strain. That was simply the way of things. It was a miracle, claimed the physician, that he’d survived as long as he had, that he’d lived nineteen good, Christian years.

It was 1910, and Grace was fifteen.

(If her brother’s life was a miracle, what was his death?)

Brian had taken her hand at the funeral, saying that he was there for her.

She’d felt warmly for Brian.

He’d been friends with both of her brothers, and she’d grown up with him. He’d known everything about Grace, known her habits, and her interests, known she sang very well but was dreadful on a piano, known that she loved wildflowers, and kerry apple cake, and used to run about the grounds with her father’s hunting hounds. He’d asked her to marry him in front of a crowd of people on her birthday, and she’d agreed. He’d been in love with her, and unafraid to show it, to announce it, to kiss her in the street, smothering her laughter, and her insistence that people were looking at them.

She’d been content with him, and with the life in front of her.

The war had started a year after that, and everything had changed by the time it was finished. She had changed. She’d pressed the ring into Brian’s hand, because there hadn’t been anything left for her in Ireland.

There had been a lot she might have said in explanation.

She could have told him that her father was murdered, and justice wasn’t done, and she needed to see that it was. She could have told him that when she looked at him, she thought of Brady, and while she’d thought it was terrible to lose one of her brothers to a weak, doomed heart, it was something truly unbearable to lose the other to a war. She could have told him that she cared for him, but she wasn’t ready for marriage, or children.

Instead, she’d told him the simplest of the truths she was keeping.

“I feel about love the way I do about God,” she’d said. “It’s nice to imagine. But where is it when you need it most?”

\---

She saw Tommy as soon as she turned the corner. He was smoking, and waiting, leaning on the brick. She refused to falter, and he straightened at her approach, dropping his cigarette, and putting it out with the toe of his shoe.

“I read in the paper about Botetourt,” he greeted.

She unlocked the door.

“Did you know he was sympathetic to the IRA? Got in a lot of trouble, I read. He claimed that he was framed, but the evidence was against him.”

“Is that so?”

“I mentioned you to my sister,” he replied. “Turns out she knew of you, and your dealings. How you’re a secretary for an attorney’s office, but you take on cases of your own on the side. Said she’s sent people to you, because you help them. You have a way of making villains crumble, although, of course, there’s never proof that you were responsible. She knew all that, and hadn’t bothered to tell me.”

“I assume your being here means she must have given me up finally,” Grace said.

“Yes.”

She bit her lip. “Would you like to come up for a cup of tea?” She opened the door, because she knew what his answer was going to be.

He followed her in.

Her flat was small, though it wasn’t as shoddy as the place she kept in Birmingham. It had a phone, and larger, nicer windows. She took off her coat at the door, and took Tommy’s coat from him.

He looked about while she hung them, and she let him.

“You have a cat,” he said, surprised.

She smiled, and passed her tabby, petting the top of his head. “Mr. Paws,” she said. “He was a stray."

“ _Mr._?” Tommy repeated.

“He’s a right, proper gentlemen,” she said, daring him to tease her.

“Ah. Pleasure to meet you, Mr _._ Paws. _Sir_.”

She smiled. But she turned quickly away before Tommy saw, and touched at her hair for something to do with her hands. He was unsettling her. “Have a seat,” she told him. “I’ll be a minute with the tea.”

In the kitchen, she thought of putting a plate of biscuits on the tray.

She didn’t.

She brought the tray in, and found him standing by the fireplace. He glanced at her. “Who is that?” he asked, nodding at the photographs.

She set down the tray. “One of my brothers,” she replied. “William. He died when we were children. He was born with a defect in his heart, and it gave out.”

“How many brothers do you have?”

“None,” she said. “I used to have two, but William died when we were young, and Brady in France. He was an officer.” Her gaze went to the photograph of Brady with their father, their uncles, and several of her cousins, hanging on the wall by the window. “Officers die, too.”

He was silent, and she sat, pouring a cup of tea for each of them.

He sat, too.

“Why did you ask you sister about me?” She looked at him. “Why did you come here?”

“I wanted to . . . thank you.” He cleared his throat. “I owe you. You didn’t have to phone me with your . . . gossip. I appreciate that you did.”

“You couldn’t have phoned to share your gratitude?”

“Do you like Charlie Chaplain?”

She blinked, trying to catch up. “Yes, I like Charlie Chaplain,” she said. “Why?”

“How’d you like to hear him speak?”

She raised her eyebrows.

“I want to impress you. Come on. Put on something nice, and I’ll take you out. Trust me. You’ll be impressed.”

“Put on something nice?” she repeated, and she tried to keep her face impassive despite her sudden, choking disappointment at the realization of why he’d really come tonight, of what he wanted from her. “Do you want to impress me, Tommy? Or use me for a whore?”

“I think you’ve made it clear that you aren’t anyone’s whore, Grace.”

She considered him.

He waited.

“Fine,” she said. She took a sip of her tea, and stood. “You’ll wait here?” she asked.

He nodded.

She went into her bedroom, closing the door, and pausing for a moment, closing her eyes. What was she doing? She opened her eyes. She knew exactly what she was doing, and she knew she shouldn’t be doing it. She was going to anyway. She moved into the room, and began to undress. It was silly, but she picked one of her newer, more fashionable dresses. She did up her hair, and fixed her makeup, expecting him to call at her to hurry up.

He didn’t.

She emerged from her room at last, and saw that Mr. Paws had moved to sit beside him on the settee. Tommy was straight-backed, and looked slightly uncertain at the cat’s presence. She burst into laughter at the sight, drawing his attention.

His gaze swept over her.

“Well, how do I look?” she asked.

He nodded. “It looks like you’re ready to meet Charlie Chaplain.” He stood.

He meant it literally; he took her to _meet_ Charlie Chaplain. Chaplain was charming, and Grace was flustered in his presence despite herself. Chaplain asked her for a dance, surprising her, and delighting her.

“I hope that fellow knows what a gorgeous girl he’s got,” Chaplain said.

She smiled.

She’d admit to herself later that what really made her flush with pleasure that night was the fact that she was at the party with Tommy. It was assumed that Grace was _with_ Tommy, that she was his date, and that he belonged to her, too. She pretended it was true.

They danced, and she relished in his closeness, in the clasp of his warm, dry hands, and in the smell of him, of soap, and cigarettes.

She knew what was going to happen when she invited him up again at the end of the night.She let him into her bed. She’d _missed_ him. She wasn’t going to pretend she hadn’t, didn’t try disguising the want in her voice when she drew away from his kisses to ask repeatedly if he had anyone until at last he gave an answer, and she knew she could have him.

She told him while they were dressing after. “He watches me, you know,” she said, pulling on her nightgown. She glanced at Tommy.

He was frowning.

“Campbell,” she clarified, and she saw Tommy’s fingers tighten in the middle of tying his shoe. “He might not have had an eye on me tonight. I thought you should know, though. I don’t know what your dealings with him are, but this won’t have helped them. If he comes after you in the days to come, you’ll know why. He blames you for my rebuff of him.”

He nodded.

She dropped his gaze, leaving the bedroom. She needed to clean up the tea that she’d left out earlier. He’d drunk only a little before they’d left.

“Can I see you again?” he asked.

“Depends,” she said. She turned to face him. “Did you flip a coin to decide to come to see me tonight?”

“No.”

“You came to thank me,” she said.

He reached out, brushing the backs of his fingers lightly against her cheek, and she wanted to shudder at the intimacy of the gesture, at the familiarity.

“I don’t know, Tommy,” she said, softer. She found she couldn _’t_ look at him, and she dropped her gaze to the table. “My life isn’t everything I’d thought it be, but I’m happy in a way. Contented. It frightens me to think of risking that, and. You might have forgiven me, but you haven’t forgotten, and you won’t. And if I can’t have you properly, I don’t know that. . . .” She forced her gaze up. “I can’t have all of you, and it’d break my heart just to keep having a piece of you.”

He was silent.

There was nothing to say, because they were finished.

He got his coat, shrugging it on.

He was at the door when she spoke again. “Tommy?” she said. He paused, glancing at her. “I won’t forget tonight. It was a lot of fun, meeting Charlie Chaplain.” She smiled.

“You look beautiful, Grace,” he replied, and he left.

She meant to take the tray to the kitchen, but she didn’t. She splashed cold, forgotten tea from her own, forgotten cup on herself, and swore, and sank onto the settle, pressing her hands into her face. In her quiet, empty flat, there was nobody for her to fear crying in front of.

\---

She knew Clive had a surprise for her when he took her to the opera, because he kept looking at her throughout it, and smiling. “What?” she’d whisper, and he’d shake his head, and return his gaze to the performance. Truthfully, it was making her nervous, and she was fidgeting on their walk after the show.

“Here,” he said. They’d stopped in the middle of the street. “Here’s the spot.”

“Here?”

“This is where I was standing the very first time I saw you.”

She didn’t know what to say. She smiled, and that seemed to satisfy him, because he smiled, too, a bright, eager smile, and he got down on his knee. It stole her breath.

He asked her to marry him, to come to America with him, and he went on, and on, saying that he’d fallen in love with her the moment he’d seen her, and only come to care more deeply for her with each passing day. “I love you,” he said, “and I want to spend the rest of my life with you. He was so keen, so bright-eyed, and truthful, and happy, and she was speechless.

“Clive,” she said, because she had to say _something._

“Is something the matter?”

She swallowed. “I care about you, too,” she said, trying to soften her refusal. “But my life is in London.”

He stood, and took her hands, pressing the box into her palm. “Think about it,” he said. “I love you, Grace.” He smiled. He was refusing to accept her refusal. She nodded, and smiled, too, and allowed him to press a kiss to her cheek.

\---

She’d been feeling under the weather recently, had lost her appetite, and tired very easily.

She learned the results of the tests on her lunch, sitting in the small, dark private physician’s office. His gaze was a cocktail of curious, apologetic, and pitying when he assured her that he was really quite certain of the results. She thanked him. She needed to go. She was expected to be back at work for the afternoon. She returned to the office, and got to work. Half an hour, and she begged off, claiming she had a headache. They believed her, and the attorney, Blackwell, squeezed her shoulder, and told her to feel better soon.

\---

Something took a hold of her lungs when she read the name of the racehorse in the paper, making it hard to breathe, and she didn’t know what to think, what to _feel_. She knew, though, that she needed to talk to him, and she wasn’t going to do it over the phone. She had to go to Epsom, and take this chance to talk to him.

She found him easily, and got his attention, calling his name.

He frowned at the sight of her.

“We need to talk.”

“I’m in the middle of something.”

“You’re always going to be in the middle of something.” She grasped his arm. “Tommy, we _need_ to talk.”

“Can’t it wait?” he said. “I’ll phone you. I’ll come to see you in London.”

“No.”

He sighed.

“What business could you have that’s possibly so important it can’t wait while you talk to me for a half a minute?”

“I’m here to kill a man.”

She stared.

“If you want to talk, you’re going to have to wait.”

She swallowed, and lowered her voice to a hiss. “How do you plan to kill a man at a race that the _king_ is attending?” Her mind was racing, trying to decide what to do with this.

“I’m going to get him alone.”

“How?”

“I—brought a friend.”

She scoffed. “Do you know any way of dealing with men beside whoring women out to them?” He was unbelievable.

He pursed his lips, and grabbed at her elbow, pulling her through the crowd. “Nothing is going to happen to her,” he said, quieter. “She’ll get him to some private place, and as soon as she does, I’ll kill him. Now if you still want to talk, I’ll find you after, and we’ll talk. Satisfied?”

“I’ll do it.”

“What?”

“I don’t know whom you’ve got to agree to this, but I’m sure she won’t be able to protect herself,” Grace said. “I can. I’ll do it. And when it’s done, we _are_ going to talk.”

“No.”

“Why?”

“Why?” he repeated. “ _Because._ Because I don’t want you—”

“To be hurt?” she challenged. “I thought you said the woman would be fine?” She raised her eyebrows. “You might have come back for me that day, Tommy, and if you hadn’t, I would have fended for myself, and I would have been fine. But _if_ you hadn’t, and I weren’t who I am, I would have been raped. Is that what’s going to happen to this girl? Is that why I can’t do it? Or can’t I do it because you don’t trust me?”

He glared.

She crossed her arms, and she won.

His hand was bruising her arm when he led her through the crowds.

They hadn’t gone far when a woman called out Tommy’s name in excitement, and Grace knew this was whom he’d chosen to play a whore. She recognized the woman’s face from the Garrison, though she couldn’t remember her name. The woman’s smile faltered slightly at the frustration that was brimming on Tommy’s face.

“What do you want me to do?” she asked, hesitant.

“Find my brother Finn,” he ordered. “I’m sure he’s snuck in here. Keep an eye on him, and make sure he doesn’t get into trouble."

She was surprised.

Tommy was unconcerned, and he tugged Grace up the steps, and away from the woman.

“Is she your barmaid now?” Grace asked, trying to catch his gaze.

“You really want to do this?” he said. He looked her over. “You don’t exactly say for sale in that.”

Self-conscious, she shrugged off her coat, and gave it to him. ”I’ll manage,” she said. She’d dressed up, thinking that the prestige of Epsom gave the excuse, because, fine, yes, she was a woman, and she’d thought it couldn’t hurt anything to look pretty when she told the man she was in love with that she was pregnant with his child.

“Do you have a gun?”

“Yes.”

He seemed to be searching her face for something, and she let him, lifting her chin up slightly, and meeting his stare.

\---

She really had planned to go to New York City after she left Birmingham. She’d always loved stories about America, about the possibilities. She should have known that imagining a future in America with Tommy was a naïve, impossible dream. Still. Even after he’d failed to come to London to meet her, she’d planned to go.

There hadn’t been anything left for her in England.

She didn’t have a career, wasn’t about to return to her family, knew that Campbell was never, ever going to forget what she’d done.

But the night before she was set to sail, a friend had come to her, and asked for help.

She’d met Jenny on the very first case that she’d worked for the crown, and forged a friendship that she’d thought was destroyed at the revelation of Grace’s identity. Apparently, that hadn’t been the case. Jenny had married, and her husband had turned out to be a lout, taking the money that she earned, and leaving her, and their children, with nothing to live on.

Grace saw to it that he was ruined.

It was the best she’d felt in a long, long time, destroying that man, and she wanted to do it again.

\---

She sat beside him, and ordered a drink. Field Marsh Russell wasn’t particularly large, although he was clearly built heavily. She crossed her legs, showing off a small, tantalizing strip of thigh. She felt his gaze, and ordered a drink, waiting to smile until after she’d downed it.

It was easy, flirting, and getting him to follow her.

Men were easy.

He was at her back immediately, but she turned, and put a hand on his chest, toying with a button. She tilted her head, holding his gaze, and beginning to unbutton his uniform. “Such a pretty pink dress,” he said. “Take it off.” He didn’t bother waiting for a response, surging in, and assaulting her. She grappled with her purse, finding the shape of the revolver, and shoved him away from her, slapping him across the face. “Stupid fucking whore,” he said, and he lunged.

She swung her purse up between them, so the bullet sank right into his chest when she fired it.

He jerked, and she stumbled back away from him.

His knees hit the ground, and the rest of him followed, and she was left to look at his blank, dead eyes, and the trickle of blood that had bubbled up out of his mouth.

There was the taste of pomegranates in the back of her mouth.

She heard the clatter of footsteps, and she breathed in sharply, readying a breathless, tearful explanation.

It was Tommy.

“You’re late,” she said, swallowing.

He looked at the officer and at her again. “I’m sorry.” He was out of breath. “I . . .” He shook his head, and reached for her, touching her arm and her face. “I’m sorry.” He swallowed, and dropped his hand from her cheek, shaking his head. “You need to get out of here.”

“I’m pregnant.”

“What?”

“I won’t get rid of it. I want it. I’m going to have this baby.”

He stared.

“I’m not asking anything from you. But I—I need to say that I want you, too. I love you. Still. I don’t know what that’s worth, but it’s the truth, and I needed to have said it just once.” Her chest was burning with want and fear and hope. “I love you, Tommy Shelby.”

He nodded. “Give me the gun.” He looked at Field Marshall Russell.

She took the gun from her purse, handing it to him.

“Go,” he said. “Get out of here. I’ll come to you after everything’s over, I promise.”

She nodded.

She turned to go, and he grabbed her arm, turning her and pulling her to him, tilting her head back with the force of his kiss. She stepped in closer, and opened to her mouth to him. He lifted his hands up to clutch her face, and the revolver was in his hand, brushing her cheek.

She wasn’t ready for him to pull away.

“Go,” he said. He fired the gun in the air repeatedly. “ _Go_.”

She left, hurrying out through the back, and pressing her torn, ruined purse to her chest to hide the evidence.

\---

Her eyes were closed for just a moment when Campbell said her name, and she opened them quickly, letting the smoke curl form her mouth, and trying to keep a calm, cool face when she met his gaze.

“What are you doing here?” he asked.

“I’ve put money on a horse,” she said. She took another drag. “I’ve found I’m too anxious to watch the race, though."

He was quiet.

“What are you doing here?” she asked.

“I know you were with him again,” he said, quieter. “Why? I want to know why.”

She dropped his gaze. The body of the man she’d murdered for Tommy wasn’t far, and wasn’t cold. She needed to be careful.

“You’re here to see him today, aren’t you?”

“I love him.”

“You’re a _whore_.”

“There isn’t such a thing,” she said, tilting her chin up. She was tired of Campbell’s obsession, of his gaze, of his _judgment_. “That’s a made up word that men use for women who won’t have sex with them, but will have it with others. I’d imagine there are a lot of whores in your life, aren’t there?”

In a fury, he wrapped his hand around her throat.

She stared.

He seemed to become aware suddenly of the fact that they were in public, that he’d drawn a couple of half-interested, curious eyes, and he released her, pushing his shoulders back slightly. His jaw clenched, and unclenched. “You’re not the woman I thought you were,” he said, glaring at the ground.

“No,” she said. “I’m not. I never have been.”

He didn’t look at her again before he turned and left, and she watched him stalk away from her, hoping it would be the very last time.

\---

She woke to knocking on the door, and frowned, rubbing at her eyes, and trying to see the time on her clock. It was the middle of the night. The knocking hadn’t stopped, and she was struck with panic. Coppers? She pulled on her robe, knotting it closed, and went to the door, hesitant. “Who is it?” she asked.

“Tommy.”

She relaxed, and unlocked the door, letting him in. “It’s late,” she said. She locked it again, and turned to him.

“I was going to come in the morning, but I . . .”

She nodded.

He followed her into the flat.

“How was the rest of your afternoon?” she asked.

“Fine,” he said. She sat, and he sat, too, taking off his cap, and holding it in his hands. He cleared his throat.

There was a lot that she could ask, but she started with the question that she probably should have asked yesterday. “Why did you need to kill that officer?” she asked. It wouldn’t change anything; she’d made her choice, and done the deed. Still. She wanted to know.

“I was chosen.”

“Chosen?”

“To be an assassin for the crown,” he said. “I thought it would be over after this. But now I don’t think it will be.”

It was quiet.

“You’re pregnant.”

“Yes.”

He turned his cap in his hands.

“I have someone, you know,” she said, and it drew his gaze to her. “He’s an American, and successful, a banker. He’s been courting me for some time now, and, recently, he asked me to marry him. I refused, but he is really quite earnest. He told me to think about it.”

Tommy stared, and wet his lips, looking away from her for a moment to take a pack from his pocket, and light a cigarette, take a drag. “Do you plan to accept?” He looked at her again, frowning.

“How can I?” She crossed her arms. “He’s going to learn that I’m pregnant, and there’s no chance that he’s the father.”

“None?”

“He’s courted me properly,” she said. “There’s been nothing untoward between us.” She pursed her lips, challenging; she doubted he could say the same about that pretty horse trainer.

He was silent.

She sighed. “I had a life, Tommy. I had a job, and I helped the people who needed it, and I had a good, sweet man. I was content. Twice, you know. Twice, I’ve had a good, content life, and it’s been ruined. It was the war before that lead me to . . . and _now_ . . .”

“It wasn’t my intention to ruin your life.”

“You didn’t,” she said. “ _I_ did. I went to see you, I phoned you, I invited you into my home.”

“Why?”

“You know why.”

“You love me,” he said. “You love me, and you’re going to have my baby.”

“I’ve still got my job,” she told him, tilting her chin up slightly. “I’ve got an inheritance, too. I’ll delve into that if that’s what it takes to manage.”

“Marry me.”

She pressed her lips together to keep them from trembling.

“I’m done with the past. You’ve proved whose side you’re on. I know I can trust you. That’s what you meant to do, isn’t it?” He raised his eyebrows. “That’s why you volunteered to kill Field Marshall Russell?”

“Yes.”

He nodded, and stubbed his cigarette.

“Tommy.”

“Marry me.”

“Why?”

He stared. “Because,” he said. “Because you understand, Grace. Because you fuckin’ understand. That’s why.”

She wanted it badly, wanted _him._

He stood.

She looked up, meeting his gaze when he circled her small tea table, and came to her.

He pulled her up, grasping her arms, and his stare was unrelenting. “Because,” he said. He reached up to cup her face. She was tearing up, through trying desperately not to. “Because I _love_ you, Grace.”

“Do you mean it?”

He kissed her.

She clutched at his arms, leaning her forehead on his.

“I’m on my way, Grace,” he murmured. “I’ve nearly made it. Once I get the licenses for Epsom, I can finish with that other stuff. I’ll be legitimate. I can take care of you.”

“I don’t need you to take care of me.”

“I know.”

She met his gaze.

“You’ll help me?” he asked, stroking her cheek with his thumb.

“Yes.” She leaned her face into his palm. “ _Yes_ , Tommy.”

He stepped in closer to her, wrapping his arms around her, and hugging her, pressing his face into her cheek. She closed her eyes, holding him. “I thought I was going to die yesterday,” he murmured. “I was going to die, and all I could think was that I’d only just got you back.” He kissed her cheek, and her lips. His breath was warm on her face, intoxicating her.

She reached up between them, opening his coat.

He took his arms away from her, allowing her to push the coat off his shoulders, and he untied her robe while she unbuttoned his vest. She shrugged off the robe, kissing him, and he took off the vest. They undressed piece by piece, kissing in between, and, leaving a trail of clothes from the kitchen to the bedroom.

She ran her hands up his back greedily when he climbed onto top of her, feeling the flex of his muscles, and gripping his arms, his shoulders. He pressed a line of hot, open-mouthed kisses down her throat, and down to her breasts, and she curled her fingers into his shoulder, into his hair, gasping at the scrape of his teeth. Her breasts were sensitive with pregnancy, and she arched into his mouth, wanting more, wanting him, wanting everything. He lifted his head at last to kiss her again, and she ran her hands slowly down his chest, and stomach, and grasped his hips, tilting her own, and spreading her thighs to bring him in closer, brushing her heat against the length of him. He groaned into her mouth. She slid her hands around to his ass, and pressed her head back into the pillows when he pushed into her.

His lips had stilled against her gasping, parted mouth, and he held her gaze when he began to fuck her.

She scraped her nails up his back. “I love you,” she breathed, because she was allowed to say it now. “I love you, Thomas.” She gripped the back of his neck. “I love you.”

He kissed her.

She titled her hips, and took him deeper, catching her breath at the feeling.

He breathed her name, and she swallowed his breath, held it deep in her lungs, and wrapped her arm around his neck, holding him closer.

She was first to come, because she was always first with Tommy.

They lay in silence after, and she thought she might fall asleep with the warmth of him at her side, with his chest under her cheek, and his fingers stroking her arm absently.

“Your breasts are bigger,” he said.

She laughed. “I’m pregnant,” she told him, and she tilted her head up to press a kiss to his jaw, happy.

“I love you,” he said, softer, and he turned his gaze to her.

She shifted, and kissed him, smiling into his lips when he combed his fingers into her hair, and tucked it behind her ear. He was here. He was in her bed, was stroking her hair, was going to be her husband, and the father of her child. She pressed her palm to his chest, and felt his heart beating into her hand, and she couldn’t really remember the last time that she’d felt this kind of happiness, this kind of _giddiness_ , but she was light with it now. If he didn’t have his arm around her, she might have floated off with the lightness of it.

\---

He was up before her in the morning. She woke to feel that the mattress was warm where he’d been, and she saw him, buttoning his shirt, and she sat up, pushing her hair away from her face. He couldn’t have gotten more than four hours of sleep, yet he was awake, and fastening the collar of his shirt.

“What do you have to do today?” she asked.

He glanced at her.

She pulled the sheet up to cover her breasts, realizing they were bare. “It’s early,” she added.

He pulled his suspenders on, and approached her.

She tilted her head up for his kiss.

It was a sweet, chaste kiss, and he paused, and hovered, reaching a hand between them, and tugging at the sheet, pulling it down. He held her gaze, looking at her with a playfulness that made her toes curl with affection for him. She smiled, and he kissed her again.

He straightened.

“Stay,” she said. “I’ll make you breakfast. I’ve got toast, and I’ll fry up eggs for you, and rashers, tomato.”

“I have business,” he said.

“Does it have to do with Field Marshall Russell?”

“No.”

She raised her eyebrows.

“I need to talk with my horse’s trainer.”

“Mrs. Carlton.”

He blinked.

“We met at the races after I separated from you. She’s lovely. She was assured of herself, and of you.”

He sighed. “She’s a very good trainer,” he said, sitting on the edge of the bed to pull on his socks. “She’s been honest with me, and I need to be honest with her.”

“She is pretty, too,” she said.

“She isn’t you.”

He said it with such finality that she couldn’t help reaching for him, touching his face, and drawing him closer, kissing him. She opened her mouth to his, and deepened it, sliding her tongue over his. He shifted, and was suddenly on top of her, pushing her into the pillows. “I thought you had business,” she teased, pulling the tails of his shirt out from his trousers.

“Buisness’ll keep.”

She laughed, and helped him fumble with the fastenings on his trousers.

After, she made him sit in the kitchen while she cooked up something to eat. “The American,” he said, lighting a cigarette, and when she glanced at him, his gaze was on her cat. “You’ll get rid of him?”

“Today,” she promised.

He kissed her before he left, and touched her face in that way of his, gentle, and reassuring. “There are things I need to tell you,” he murmured. “Later. We’ll talk. I’ll explain all of yesterday, and all of tomorrow. Yes?” She nodded, and took another kiss.

\---

She’d been shaken after Kimber had tried to attack her, shaken, and shocked, and that was when she’d realized that a part of her had actually, truly _trusted_ Tommy. She’d trusted him, and he’d used her. He had returned for her, of course, and she didn’t know what to think of that, of _him_. She’d hated that she’d come to trust him, though. She’d told herself she wouldn’t be disarmed by him again.

He’d returned for her, but that didn’t excuse what he’d done.

Tommy fuckin’ Shelby had a conscious. That, or he’d got a fondness for her. He remained a criminal who carelessly used people to suit his needs.

But when he’d come into the Garrison the very next evening, she’d avoided his gaze. She’d poured him a drink, and carried on, ignoring him. She’d known that she couldn’t keep that up, that she’d need to return to lingering, and smiling, and coaxing his trust, but she’d wanted to punish him.

He’d noticed.

She’d felt his stare more that night than ever before.

He’d been the last to leave in the evening, and when he rose up, she’d turned to him.

“Can I assume that you’re taking your brother?” she’d asked.

He’d frowned.

She’d nodded her head, and he’d had to lean over the bar to see where Finn was sleeping on the floor behind the bar, using Grace’s coat for a crumpled, makeshift pillow.

“How long has he been there?”

“Hours. He claimed he was going to help me close up.”

Tommy had scooped up his brother, and Grace had tried to keep from staring at the pair. Her brothers had toted her about like that once upon a time. At that moment, she’d wondered what Tommy had been like before the war. Before he’d left the pub with Finn in tow, she’d given him a smile, and told herself it was because she needed to earn his trust.

\---

She was in Blackwell’s office with him, was by his side behind the desk, and she didn’t immediately look up when Janet knocked, and opened the door.

“There’s a man to see you,” Janet said, hesitant. “Grace.”

She looked up in surprise.

“He is here to see you, Grace. He’s insistent. Says he can't come back later.”

“Excuse me,” Grace said, and at Mr. Blackwell’s nod, she left his office. It was Tommy. “Is something the matter?” she asked, lowering her voice to keep the other, nosy secretaries from listening in when she approached him.

“Did you talk to the American?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said.

He nodded. “But you haven’t quit your job,” he said. He glanced at one of the secretaries, and she looked away quickly.

“Not yet."

“Grace is going to have to resign,” he said, raising his voice. She gaped. But he was looking past her, and she turned her head quickly to see that Mr. Blackwell had left his office, and Tommy was speaking to him.

“I beg your pardon?” Blackwell said.

“Thomas,” Grace said.

“She is going to be married,” Tommy continued, “and she’ll be moving to Birmingham.” He raised his eyebrows. “She’ll have no need of a job in London.”

“Grace, is this true?”

“I . . . I’m happy to work until a replacement is found,” she said.

“Um,” Blackwell said. He cleared his throat. “No. No, that isn’t necessary.” He glanced at Tommy, and at Grace again. “I’ll put your last week’s pay in the post.”

“No,” Tommy said. “That isn’t necessary.”

It was silent.

“Grace,” Tommy said.

She pursed her lips, and went to her desk, getting her purse from under it, and taking her sweater from the back of her chair. _Damn it, Tommy._ She gave Mr. Blackwell a small, apologetic smile. His smile back wasn't much to speak of. Tommy held open the door for her, touching his hand to her back when she passed him, and following her from the office.

In the street, she turned to him in annoyance.

He lit a cigarette.

“What the hell was that?”

“You resigned from a job you don’t need,” he replied.

“ _I_ resigned, did I?”

He was quiet.

“It hasn’t been a week since we got engaged, and I’ve hardly seen you in that time.”

“I had things I needed to settle with Solomons.”

She began walking down the street.

“I got the licenses for Epsom,” he said, “which means my business in London is done for the moment.”

“Congratulations.”

He grabbed her arm, stopping her, and forcing her to look at him.

But from the corner of her eye, she noticed a small, pale face peeking at them hesitantly from around the corner. She caught his eye, and tilted her head, gesturing. He eyed Tommy, but he seemed to decide it was safe if Grace was beckoning, and he hurried to her.

She fished an apple from her purse, and crouched to his height, pressing it in his hands.

He cupped his hand around her ear, and whispered to her.

She smiled.

He ran off quickly after that, holding a hand to his cap to keep it from coming off his head.

She straightened.

“Children?” Tommy was amused. “Is that how you get all of your information?”

“Children are ignored. They’re overlooked and forgotten, especially when they’re on the street. But they aren’t blind, and they aren’t deaf. They know more than you’d think.”

He smiled.

“Do you want to know what he had to tell me?”

“Later.”

She raised her eyebrows.

He stepped in closer, and cupped her face in his hand, kissing her. She was breathless when he drew away again, and took a small jewelry box from his pocket, opening it. She gaped. It was _beautiful_ , and must have cost a fortune. She tore her gaze from the diamonds to look at him. His eyes were bright with the smile that was playing on his lips, and he took the ring from the box, taking her hand, and putting it on her finger. “It suits you,” he said. She looked at her hand, at the ring, and at him again. He was pleased with himself.

“It’s beautiful,” she told him.

“Finish up your business in London,” he said, touching her cheek. “The sooner you do, the sooner we can return to Birmingham. I plan to make a Shelby of you before my baby is born.”

\---

In the end, she didn’t have much to pack up. She owned very little of value, or that was important to her personally; everything she wanted to keep fit easily into a couple of suitcases. She had Mr. Paws, too, in a small basket carrier, but she was able to tuck that in by her feet in the car, and Tommy loaded the suitcases into the back.

She returned to Birmingham on a gray, rainy Tuesday.

It was strange, knowing she was going into her future while feeling as though she were going into her past. There was no room for doubt, though. Tommy put his hand on her knee, and she covered his hand with her own, grasping it.

\---

Tommy had told his family about Grace. He’d told them that she’d been helping him with things in London, that they were expecting a baby, and they planned to marry, and it wasn’t a discussion. “They’ll warm up to you,” he said, unloading her suitcases from the car.

She was doubtful.

She knew that Ada was fine with her; Ada respected Grace’s efforts to help those in need, and, truthfully, Ada’s distaste for her family’s dealings made it easier for her to forgive Grace’s betrayal.

It was the rest of the family that she’d have to contend with.

Things were awkward that night at the Garrison.

Everyone awkwardly skirted what she’d done, and whom she’d been working for the very last time she’d been in the pub. Or they did at first. “Tommy says we’re to trust you now,” Arthur said, abrupt. “He says you’re forgiven.” He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and eyed her, expecting an answer.

“I’m not forgiven until you forgive me,” she replied.

“Why should I?”

“Because I’m sorry,” she said. “Because I didn’t . . . I didn’t know you. Because I liked you, and I’m sorry.” It was the truth. “I’m sorry, Arthur,” she told him, soft.

John scoffed.

“Right,” Arthur said. He sniffed, and he clapped a hand to her shoulder. “You better take good care of our Tommy, you hear? He’s in need of a good woman. Oi, Harry! Get us a round, will you?”

She smiled, and leaned into Tommy’s side.

The rest of the night was better.

The morning was more of a challenge. Tommy had told her that he’d bought a nicer, larger house for Polly, and that should have meant that they’d mostly have the old, cramped Shelby home to themselves. But the very first morning that Grace woke in Tommy’s bed, she got downstairs, and Polly was sitting at the table.

“Morning,” Grace said.

Polly didn’t look up from the paper. It was quiet for a moment while Grace put a kettle on. “I told him to make you get rid of it, you know,” Polly said, turning a page.

“We don’t have to be enemies,” Grace replied.

Polly scoffed.

“I know you care about your family, and I care about your family, too,” Grace continued. “It’s going to be _my_ family very soon. You might not like it, but you can’t stop it. I love Tommy, and he loves me, too. We’re going to be married, and we’re going to have a baby.”

“He might have forgotten what you are,” Polly said, “but _I_ haven’t.”

“I’ve proven to Tommy where my loyalties lie.”

“Have you now?”

She met Polly’s gaze.

Polly took a sip of her tea. “Let’s be clear, my dear. I don’t trust you, and I’m not _going_ to trust you. Marry him, and have the baby. Fine. You’re right; I can’t stop it. You’ve fooled him. But this family still belongs to _me_ , and I’ll never accept you.” She stared, and her face was set, and certain, was daring a challenge. “You can’t get on your back, and earn _my_ trust,” she said.

“I don’t need your trust,” Grace said.

“No?”

“They aren’t children any longer, Polly. They have no need of an aunt to make their decisions for them. You think you’re the heart of your family?” She shook her head. “I don’t need your trust, because I don’t need anything from you. You don’t have anything to give.”

Polly was silent.

There was a start of a whistle, and Grace turned, took the kettle off, and kept her back to Polly.

She tensed at the sound of Polly’s chair scraping back.

Polly came up behind her, and leaned in, touching Grace’s shoulder, and enveloping her in the smell of thick, floral perfume. “We’ll just have to see how long you last, won’t we?” She squeezed Grace’s shoulder.

Finally, she left, and Grace released a breath, staring at the sink.

Day by day, it would get better.

His family had plenty of reason to dislike her. She knew that. But she’d prove to them that her loyalty was with Tommy. She’d prove to them that she was here to stay, and that she _was_ going to be a Peaky fuckin’ Blinder.

\---

She found him at his office, and he glanced up from his papers at her, seeing her, but she gave him a smile, and went to pour a drink, allowing him to return his attention to his business. She poured a dram for herself, and a dram for him, and went to his desk, sitting, and taking a sip of her drink.

He looked at her again.

She pushed his drink towards him. “Tell me,” she said. She held his gaze.

“What do you want to know?” he asked.

“I want to know what you promised to tell me.” She paused, and softened. “Tommy. I can’t not know.”

He took the glass, and took a sip.

She waited.

“It started when they blew up the Garrison,” he said, taking a pack from his pocket, and lighting a cigarette for himself.

\---

It was easier than she would have thought, falling into step with Birmingham again after years away from it.

She was at the Garrison more often than was expected, and was becoming a fixture of it again. Polly kept away from it unless she needed to be there for business, and Esme was the same, and Grace knew that it wasn’t a place for the women of the family, but she found she couldn’t be bothered to care. She’d fallen in love with Tommy in this pub, and it was a home to her.

She got a lot of gossip at the Garrison, and began to make a lot of friends.

They got into a routine; she’d finish with the books, and she’d go to the Garrison to wait for Tommy to finish his work for the day.

“Give us a song, Grace,” Arthur said.

“What?”

“You haven’t forgotten how to sing, have you?” he said, grinning “Here.” He put a chair out for her, patting the back of it.

She bit her lip.

The pub was closed, and it was only family who was in it now, waiting for Tommy to finish a meeting with a few Birmingham boys who’d asked to talk to him. She stood. Arthur gave her a hand up onto the chair, and she thought of a song for him; it was fast, and bawdy, had been a favorite of Brady’s.

Michael choked on his drink at the start of the chorus, and John, Arthur, and Finn laughed.

She winked.

They applauded when she was finished.

“You’re very good,” Michael said. “Really. Did you have a lot of lessons?”

Finn gave her a hand down from the chair, and she pressed a kiss to his cheek in thanks. “Not really,” she said. “But I’ve been singing for as long as I can remember.”

“It’s the sad, old songs that are her specialty,” Tommy said.

The boys he’d met with filed past, and out the door.

“It’s about time, Tom,” Arthur said.

“What did they want?” John asked. “I didn’t like the look of them when they came in. What did they ask for?”

“They want what everyone in Birmingham wants,” Tommy said. He paused. “They want to work for us, of course. I told him we’d take it into advisement. Now go on. Go home. We’ll have a meeting in the morning.”

The boys all went, grumbling about waiting for no good, fucking reason, and Arthur shoved Michael.

“Is that the truth?” Grace asked, skeptical.

Tommy sat at the bar, and lit a cigarette. “Mostly.” He let the smoke curl out of his mouth.

“Happy, or sad?”

He eyed her. “Sad.” He set his elbows on the bar behind him.

She got up on the chair again, and cleared her throat, smiled, and sang, memorizing the feel of his gaze on her.

\---

Polly had made it clear that she didn’t believe there wasn’t a place for Grace in the family, or in the business.

She was wrong.

Even if she had to carve it out for herself, Grace would have a place.

Tommy returned to the office, and Grace was where he’d left her, sitting at his desk, and looking at the books. “How’s it look?” he asked, and she heard the soft, telltale clicks of him pouring a drink for himself. He circled the desk, and sat on the edge. “Money’s been steady,” he said.

She drew her gaze up from the numbers. “It has.” She could hear in his voice that there was more.

“I want to start a foundation.”

“For?”

“Birmingham.” He took a sip of his drink. “It’s time we give back. You’ll run it.”

“You want to start a charity for the people of Birmingham,” she said.

“Yes.”

“Do you have a cause in mind?” she asked.

“No.”

She raised her eyebrows.

“That’s for you to decide,” he said.

“You’re in earnest,” she said.

“I am.”

She bit her lip. “Children,” she decided. “We’ll help the children of Birmingham. There are a lot of orphans in Birmingham. We’ll start a home for them, an institute.”

“Fine.”

His face was open, and agreeable, and she sat up slightly in her seat. “You really want to do this?” she asked. “You want to start a real, honest charitable foundation?” He smiled, and she began to get excited at the prospect, imagining the possibilities. “Oh, Tommy, we could—Tommy, you’ve got me thinking, and I’ve all sorts of ideas now!” She touched his knee.

“I thought you might,” he said. His eyes were bright. “We’ll have it however you like.”

“I won’t let you change your mind after this.”

“I know.” He was amused. “You needn’t worry about it; me mind’s made up.”

She beamed, and surged up with a laugh, kissing him. “I love you, Thomas Michael Shelby,” she told him. She leaned her forehead on his, and rubbed her nose to his.

He kissed her.

He drew away after a moment, cupping her face. She turned her face, and kissed his palm. He straightened, and she laughed when he turned the both of them, and hoisted her up onto the desk. “Here?” she asked, hiking up her skirt. She pressed little kisses to his lips, and pulled him between her legs.

“Yes.” He kissed her. “Here.”

It surprised her when he pulled away from her, running his hands up from her knees. She understood, though, when he dropped to his knees, and turned his face to press a kiss to her thigh. He pressed another higher, and higher. His head went under her dress. She gasped at the warmth of his breath on her, at his lips, and his tongue, and closed her eyes, breathing in sharply. She grasped at the edge of the desk, at his shoulders, at the back of his head.

She was trying to catch her breath when he rose up again, and she looked at him through heavy, hazy eyes when she heard him unfastening the front of his trousers.

She reached for his shoulders, smiling into his mouth when he pushed into her.

He lay his hands flat on the desk, and she tilted her hips, and took him deeper, hugging his neck while he fucked her.

“Tommy, let’s have horses at the institute,” she breathed.

“Horses?”

“The children can learn proper care of them! Think, it’d be good for them! I want them to learn honest, useful skills."

He laughed.

“Should I not be talking of this now?”

“No, Grace,” he said, kissing her neck. His strokes into her were steady, and unrelenting, stealing her breath again; his empty whiskey glass was rattling with the shaking of the desk. “Go on. Tell me. Tell me what you’re thinking, and all your ideas for our institute.”

\---

She hadn’t been seated at the bar for more than a minute when she felt a man at her back, pressing in closer than he should, and a hand was heavy on her shoulder.

“You haven’t got anybody with you, sweetheart?” he asked, a grin in his voice.

“Go away,” she said.

“There’s no need to be like that,” he replied, unperturbed, and he sat beside her, keeping his arm around her back.

“I’m _taken_ ,” she said, tight-lipped.

He chuckled.

There were a lot of things that she could have done in that moment.

“Mate,” Harry said, seeing.

Grace caught John’s gaze, and saw the smile from his conversation turn brittle, and break. He pushed back violently from the bar, and started to them. The man likely realized his mistake at John’s approach, because his arm fell away from Grace, and he started to apologize.

“I didn’t—”

John grabbed the front of his shirt, and yanked. The man half-stumbled, half-toppled off his stool, shaking his head. “Who the _fuck_ do you think you are?” John demanded, trapping the man against the counter, and stabbing at his chest. “You come into _our_ pub, and you touch _our_ women?” He stepped in closer, getting in the man’s pale face. “You know who that is?” He pointed at Grace. “That’s my brother’s woman. Did you know that? Huh? You put your hands on _my_ _brother’s woman_.” He was a breath from the man’s face at this point, glaring.

“I’m sorry!”

“You’re sorry?” John repeated. “You’re _sorry_?” He punched him, then yanked him up, and punched him again.

The pub had quieted.

John didn’t let up until the man was curled on the ground with a bloody, swelling face, hugging his middle, and coughing on blood.

John took the toothpick from his mouth, and spat on the man, turning at last. He looked at Grace. She smiled at him in gratitude, and he nodded, touching her arm, and swiping a kiss to her cheek before he put the pick right back in his mouth, and returned to his table.

She’d understood John from the start; he was protective of his family, of his people.

She gave a smile to Harry, and stood, seeing a woman on the stairs.

She went to the back, and the woman went to the back, too, meeting her, and starting to talk as soon as she was in front of Grace. She was bright-eyed, and eager to share. Grace gave her a tenner for the gossip.

\---

She’d handed over a ring of gamblers in Dublin to the Crown on her very first assignment. She’d been lauded for the work. But she hadn’t been interested in petty criminals, or dirty money. She’d wanted more. She’d wanted to work a case that hurt the IRA, that fed the fire that burned in her chest, and threatened to consume her.

There were rules when you were an agent of the Crown, though. She’d been forced to wait. She’d been forced to do what she was told.

\---

He woke her up when he pulled at the sheets, and crawled into the bed. She didn’t bother opening her eyes. He brought with him the smell of sweat, and road, and cigarettes, and he pulled her back into his chest, wrapping his arm around her, and surrounding her, warming the back of her neck with his breath.

“What time do you call this?” she mumbled.

He laughed, and it was low, and tired, was a broken, choking sound.

She turned in his arms, and opened her eyes. The light was on; she’d left it on for him when she’d gone to bed, and she frowned at the sight of him now in the soft yellow glow. His cheek was swelling with a bruise, and his lip was cut.

“Sabini’s done,” he murmured.

She touched his face.

He swallowed. “It was a slaughter,” he said. His hand was heavy on her hip.

She slid her hand around to the back of his head, and tilted her head up, pressing her lips to his forehead. He shifted still closer at the kiss, burying his face in her neck, and she took the brunt of his weight, holding him to her. “Now it’s over?” she asked, stroking his back.

“Yes.”

“Good.”

“There was a boy, Grace,” he said.

She reached for his hand, and knew by touch that his knuckles were swollen, and cut up. She grasped it gently, and moved it down to her thigh, sliding it under her nightgown, and up to rest on the swell of her belly. “You do what you have to do to take care of our family, Thomas,” she said. She felt his fingers curl slightly. “We love you,” she whispered, and she closed her eyes, feeling the tension slowly leave him.

She felt his lips on her neck, moving in imitation of a kiss.

She shifted, and when he raised his head to kiss her on the mouth, she touched his chin, and deepened it.

She pushed on his chest, and he moved onto his back while she rose up. He lifted his hips slightly to let her pull down his pants, and his hand brushed her arms, her elbows, her hips, steadying her when she hiked up the skirt of her nightgown, and straddled his hips.

He never took his eyes off her when she sank onto him.

She took her time, rolling her hips, and fucking him slowly, relishing in the fullness of having him inside her.

She closed her eyes after a minute, leaning forward slightly to change the angle, and getting swept away in the sensations. He slid his hand up her throat to cup her jaw, and when his thumb rubbed against the part of her lips, she let him push it into her mouth, and sucked on the tip. He slipped his hand down again, and pulled at the strap of her gown; it fell easily over the curve of her shoulder, allowing him to slip his hand into the gown, and palm her breast, and she covered his large, battered hand with her own, keeping it there.

“Tommy,” she breathed.

She clenched purposefully around him when she began to come, and he squeezed her breast in answer, coming with her.

The silk of her gown was slick with sweat on her back when she collapsed onto the bed beside him.

He found her hand between them, and took it, lifting it to kiss the backs of her fingers. “We’re going to have everything, Grace,” he murmured. She looked at him. “Everything. I’m going to give you everything.”

She kissed him. “I know,” she said. She believed him.

He stroked her cheek.

She closed her eyes, and curled into Tommy’s side, putting her head on his chest, and finding his heartbeat, listening to the sweet, steady thrum of it. “I love you,” she whispered. She believed him, and trusted him, and was in for a penny, in for a pound.

\---

There was a part of her that thought it wasn’t quite worth the headache to invite her family to the wedding. But it was expected that she invite her own; if she had decided not to, Tommy’s family would have wanted an explanation. She owed it to her uncles, too, at least to send an invitation.

She wrote a letter to her uncle Colum, too, telling him that she was pregnant.

_If my condition is going to be an issue for any of my aunts, or my cousins, I’d rather they did not attend._

She wouldn’t be shamed.

She was surprised at the number of her family who wrote in reply to their invitations to say they would be in attendance.

In the end, she was happy with the ceremony.

She wore a dress that she’d bought in London with Ada, and carried a bouquet of wildflowers that Finn had picked for her, and her family was polite, and kept their thoughts on her pregnancy, Tommy’s family, and the eccentrics of Birmingham to themselves.

The reception was at the Garrison.

She danced with Tommy, and with each of his brothers, with Johnny Dog, and Uncle Charlie, and Jeremiah Jesus, and she forgot to worry about her family.

Devlin took her hand for a dance, too; of her cousins, he was the nearest to her in age, and she’d grown up with him, though they hadn’t been close since she’d broken her engagement with Brian, and left for England.

“You seem quite happy, Gracie,” he said.

“I am.”

He began to speak in Gaelic. “You know we never would have let you marry him if he hadn’t got a child on you,” he said. She stiffened. “It’s a shame that Brady was lost to us in France. He would have kept his sister from this life.”

“It is a shame,” Grace said, speaking quietly, clearly, and in English. “It’s a shame that of all my family that fought in the war, it was only my _brother_ who was killed. I’d have handed every last one of my cousins over to the Germans if it meant I could have saved him.”

Devlin was silent.

There were a shout, and a collision, and little, eager arms were thrown suddenly around Grace’s middle, interrupting their dance.

“Karl,” she said, smiling.

“I’m going to dance with you next!” he declared.

“Excuse me,” she said, turning from Devlin before he replied, and she began to instruct Karl in how to hold his arms. Over his head, she saw that Tommy was smoking at the bar with Ada, and she knew he must have sent his nephew to her. She smiled, and “you’re a very good dancer, Karl,” she told him.

He was her nephew.

He was her _family,_ and Arthur was, and John, and Finn. Michael was her family. Ada. Esme. _Polly_. She wasn’t a Burgess. She was a Shelby, and Tommy was her family.

\---

It wasn’t long after she shook off Devlin that she joined her husband at the bar. He slid an arm over her shoulders, and she leaned her head towards him. “I’ve got a surprise for you,” he murmured. He kissed her temple, and his eyes were bright when she looked at him.

Somehow, they managed to them out of the Garrison.

They took the car.

His surprise was a house on a beautiful, sprawling estate that’s sheer size stole her breath, reminding her of the estates that she’d grown up. She stepped from the car, tracing her gaze over the grand, brown house, and a part of her was beginning to suspect why Tommy had brought her to see it. He confirmed it, though. “This is Arrow House,” he said, “and it’s our house.” She looked at him. “Welcome to your home, Mrs. Shelby.”

\---

She was in Michael’s office looking at the books with him when Polly came in, pulling up short. Her gaze went from Michael to Grace, and back. It was clear that she didn’t know what to make of the fact that Grace was in Michael’s office, that Grace was sitting at her own, new mahogany desk.

“Is something the matter, Polly?” Grace asked.

Polly ignored Grace. “I thought we might have lunch,” she said, addressing her son. Her smile was small, tight-lipped.

He blinked. “Um, sure.” He looked at the books for a moment, and at her again. “Give me a minute? I want to finish with these numbers, or it’ll be a mess to start again.”

“Certainly.”

It was silent, and uncomfortable.

“There,” Michael said, closing a book, and rising to his feet. He paused. “Grace, do you want to come?”

“I’m afraid I’m expected at the house to meet with a gardener,” Grace said.

He nodded.

Grace knew that it was a matter of time before Polly cornered her, though she hadn’t actually expected Polly to come to the house. Thus far, Polly had made a point to ignore the house in her effort to ignore Grace’s existence, and Grace was happy with the arrangement, because it made it easier for Grace to ignore Polly’s existence. Grace was overseeing the hanging of several landscape paintings in the parlor when Polly was announced, however.

“Polly,” Grace said.

Polly looked at the paintings for a moment. “My son tells me that you have taken up the position of bookkeeper. I was surprised.” She turned to Grace. “I thought you were in charge of Tommy’s _foundation_.”

“I am, but that requires I have a knowledge of the company’s finances, does it not?”

“I’ll admit that I’m impressed you’ve weaseled a desk for yourself in Michael’s office,” Polly said.

“Is there a _point_ to this conversation?” Grace said.

“You’ve got quite comfortable with my son.”

Grace was surprised. “Is that your issue with me this week? I must ask you to clarify, though. Is your concern that I’d be disloyal to my husband when I’m eight months gone with his child, or is it that your son is more relaxed in my company than when he is saddled with you?” She raised her eyebrows.

“You need to watch yourself.”

“Or what?” Grace asked. “What are you going to do? Continue to remind everyone _what I am_? Continue your efforts to undermine every suggestion I make in regards to the business? Continue to make snide comments when you can’t find a way to ignore me? Is that what I have to fear, Polly? Your _spite_?”

Polly was silent.

“Yes,” Grace said. “That’s what I thought.”

“You’ve used that baby to carve a place for yourself in this family, and this business,” Polly said. “ _We can trust her, Pol_ , they say. _She’s having Tommy’s child._ ” She shook her head. “Things are good right now. They won’t stay that way. We’ve a turn of good luck now, but it’ll pass, and when things are tough, we’ll see how you fare. We’ll see if Tommy keeps doting on you, and granting your demands.” Polly smiled coldly. “Yes. We’ll see. We’ll see if you can stomach this life, or if you’ll run just as soon as you can.”

“I won’t,” Grace said.

“We’ll see.” Polly turned, and paused, staring at the wall for a moment. “That painting is crooked,” she said, and she left.

\---

“You can’t make peace with Polly?” Tommy asked, pouring a drink for himself, and raising his eyebrows at Mr. Paws when the cat rubbed up against his leg.

“Why doesn’t Polly make peace with me?”

He eyed her, and came to sit beside her, lifting his arm, and allowing her to tuck into his side. “Pol doesn’t know what to do with you,” he said. “You aren’t like any of the women she grew up with. She doesn’t like that, but she’ll get over it. She doesn’t have a choice.” She put her head on his shoulder, breathing in the smell of soap, and cigarettes. He was always so busy these days, and she was, too. “She’ll get over it,” he repeated, and kissed her hair.

\---

She went into labor in the middle of the night, clutching at the sheets at the pain of the contraction, and Tommy’s voice was thick with sleep when he asked her if something was the matter.

It dragged on for hours upon hours.

Her bedroom was overtaken by the women of the family, and they seemed all of them to be everywhere at once, helping her through it. She clung to Ada’s hand, and listened to Esme’s directions, and struggled to keep from swearing at the pain in front of John’s daughters.

Tommy was there, too.

“My mother died giving birth to me,” she gasped, because the pain was unbearable.

He stared.

She’d never told him that, had she?

“I can see the top of his head, Grace!” Katie exclaimed. She was holding up one of Grace’s legs, and her sister had the other. “He’s got a lot of hair! It’s dark like Uncle Tommy’s!”

“You aren’t dying on this day,” Esme said, final.

She didn’t.

She got her baby out and into this world, and he had a pair of loud, healthy lungs on him. _Him._

The baby was a large, healthy boy.

He had dark, thick hair, and bright pink cheeks, and Grace was in love as soon as Esme put him into her arms. She stared at his blue, squinty eyes, and rested her hand on his tiny, pudgy torso, feeling it rise with each tiny breath he took, and fall again, and feeling the beat of his little, hummingbird heart. She’d made him, had made that heart, and brought it to life.

He was beautiful _._

“Have you picked a name for him?” Ada asked.

“Charles,” Grace said, and looked at Tommy; it wasn’t actually something they’d discussed.

He nodded.

“Charles,” she repeated.

“Uncle Charlie will like that,” Polly said.

“We can say it’s after him if he likes,” Grace said, gazing at her baby. “It’s for him, and for Charlie Chaplain, of course, and for my father.” She smiled. “Charles Thomas Shelby.” He was _perfect_.

“You’ve done well, Grace,” Tommy murmured.

“ _We_ have, Tommy,” she said. She was exhausted, but somehow the idea of sleeping at this moment was unfathomable. “We _made_ him, Tommy. We made this whole new person,” she whispered, and he kissed her temple, holding her while she held their son.

\---

She had trouble with nursing at first, and she refused to admit it to Polly, but she went to Esme for help, hoping it wouldn’t be something that Esme brushed off. Esme was startled, but she smiled, and told Grace that it took a bit of time, and, here, I’ll help you. They went to the old, empty Shelby house, and Esme got the baby to latch on.

“I’d have figured a lady like you would have hired a woman to nurse him for you,” Esme said, sitting.

“No,” Grace said. “He’s mine. I’ll nurse him.”

For those first few, tiring months, Grace stayed at the house with the baby, and left the business to the boys.

Esme was her best, most constant visitor. She’d bring her children, and they’d run about in the backyard while Grace sat with the baby, and with Esme, and they’d have food brought to them. It was a nice, easy way to pass the days.

Grace was sure to keep the baby under shade, but Esme was the opposite.

“I miss the sunshine,” Esme said, closing her eyes, and turning her face up the sun. “I like you, Grace. You’re nicer than I thought you were.”

“I like you, too,” Grace said, amused.

“It’ll be good to have somebody on my side in things,” Esme added. “The boys won’t listen when it’s only me, and Polly’s never any help. They’ll have to listen when it’s both of us, though. We’re their wives, aren’t we? We’re the mothers of their children.”

“They’ll listen if they know what’s good for them,” Grace said, and Esme’s smile was brighter than usual.

\---

Grace was working in her office when there was a knock on the door, and it opened. “You’ve a visitor, Mrs. Shelby,” Mary said. Grace finished the sentence she was writing, and looked up.

It was Lizzie.

She was swaying in the doorway, uncertain. “Lizzie,” Grace said, surprised. “Thank you, Mary,” she said, and Mary left. “Is something the matter?” she asked. She set down her pen.

“Sort of,” Lizzie said, stepping into the office.

“Have a seat.”

Lizzie sat, and held her purse in her lap, uncomfortable. “It’s about my boyfriend,” she said. She paused.

“What about him?” Grace asked.

“He is really good to me,” Lizzie said. “He cares about me, and I care about him. A lot. The problem is, well, it’s the Peaky Blinders. They—John, and Arthur, and—and Tommy, they don’t like him. They’ve got no reason not to like him, though! But they do, and they’ve already tried scaring him off, and even though it didn’t work, they won’t let up.”

“I see.”

“I’ve come to you ‘cause I was hoping you might put a word in for me.”

“I don’t really intervene in this sort of thing,” Grace said, hesitant.

“Please, they’ll listen to you,” Lizzie pleaded, leaning in slightly. “Please. Tommy only listens to you. All of us girls in the office know it. And if Tommy tells his brothers to lay off Angel, they will.”

“You’re certain you can trust him? Angel? He’s Italian, isn’t he?”

“He is.”

“Tommy’s taken a lot from Italians in London.”

“My boyfriend’s got nothing to do with Italians in London!”

“You’re a Peaky Blinder, Lizzie, and the Peaky Blinders have enemies. No, listen, I’m not saying that Angel is our enemy, or that he’s using you. I believe you when you say he cares about you.” She held Lizzie’s gaze, willing her to understand. “But even if it means nothing to him, it matters to the Peaky Blinders that you’re one of them, and your boyfriend isn’t. You’re a Peaky Blinder, and that means the boys think they own you, and they want you with one of their own.”

“None of their own _want_ me on account of—of the things I used to do.” She flushed. “Tommy might’ve given me a job, but . . .”

“I’ll talk to Tommy,” Grace said.

Lizzie’s shoulders sank slightly in relief. “Thank you,” she said. “Really.”

“But if you really love this man, it might come down to a choice. You know that, right? There might come a day when you’ve got to choose between loyalty to the Peaky Blinders, and to him.”

“If it comes down to it, I’ll make a choice,” Lizzie said, firm.

“Good.”

Lizzie got to her feet, and was at the door when she turned, and paused. “Can I ask you a question?” She curled her fingers tightly around her purse.

“Please,” Grace said.

“Do you love him?” she asked. “Tommy? I know that’s—that’s a quite personal question, but—”

“It’s fine. The answer is yes. I do.”

“Do you wish you didn’t?”

“Is there someone you wish _you_ didn’t love, Lizzie?”

She didn’t say anything, but the answer was in her gaze, and in her silence.

“John?” Grace said. “Or Tommy? I know he used to go to you.”

“No,” Lizzie said, letting out a breath, and looking away from Grace, shaking her head. She swallowed, and returned her gaze to Grace. “You’re a lot like him, you know.”

“How?”

“It’s—” She shook her head, and looked at the ground. “It’s hard to explain.”

“I’ll talk to him about your boyfriend,” Grace said.

“I appreciate it.”

There was a pause. Lizzie gave a small, uncomfortable smile, and left. Grace could hear the sound of her heels clicking down the hall, and away, and going very quickly.

\---

She hadn’t been working at the Garrison for long when Tommy had come in very late, and sat, tossing his cap onto the table in front of him.

“Sing,” he’d said.

She’d hesitated. “Should I . . . ?” She’d been uncertain if she ought to sit with him, get up on a chair, or. He hadn’t given any sort of answer, though; he hadn’t even acknowledged that she’d spoken. She’d begun to sing, collecting the glasses that were scattered on the tables while she sang, and when she’d glanced at Tommy, she’d seen that his head was tipped back, and his eyes were closed, and she’d been hit with such a wave of tenderness that she’d very nearly faltered in her song. She’d carried on, though, wiping the bar, and thinking to herself, _what did the war do to you, Thomas_?

She’d finished her song, and found him looking at her again with an expression that was unreadable, that disarmed her.

\---

Katie was enamored with the piano in Grace’s parlor, and when she learned that Grace knew how to play it, she begged Grace to teach her how to play it, too.

“I can pay for a teacher,” John said, learning of their lessons from Esme.

“I’m happy to do it,” Grace replied.

Katie wasn’t especially gifted at music, but she was earnest, and a good, attentive learner, and she was John’s daughter, which meant she spoke her mind, and often had Grace laughing when she shouldn’t. She was sweet, and easy to like. Three days a week, they practiced for an hour in the morning, and Katie improved.

Eventually, Grace planned a kind of recital for her.

They invited Katie’s family over in the evening, and Tommy was there, too, of course, and Arthur, Finn, Michael, and Polly. Katie performed on the piano while Grace turned the pages, and sang on several of the pieces at Katie’s behest, adapting to Katie’s mistakes. Overall, the performance was admirable, and earned a lot of applause, hooting, and whistling.

Arthur brought Linda.

“You play quite beautifully, Katie,” she said, giving a small, gentle smile.

Tommy was skeptical of Linda, but he seemed to be unperturbed by her that evening, and Grace was glad.

It was late when everyone left at last.

Grace saw them off, and returned to the parlor to find Tommy exactly where she’d left him. He was sitting on the settee, and smoking, staring into space. She went to close the cover of the piano.

“Do you play any?” she asked, glancing at him, and tapping a few of the keys.

“No.”

“I can teach you, too,” she offered.

“No.”

She turned to look at him, and saw his eyes were amused. She smiled. “I’m afraid I was never very good at piano,” she continued. “I can play, but only marginally well. I was told I lacked the patience to practice.” She played the beginning of a soft, simple piece, and sighed, closing the cover, and turning again. Tommy’s gaze was soft, warm, and certain, and she went to him.

His hands found her hips when she climbed on top of him, straddling his hips.

“Did you enjoy your evening?” she asked.

“I did.”

“What have you been thinking about while pretending to listen?”

“I’ve been thinking that Katie’s about as good as John at playing the piano.”

“John can play the piano?”

“No.”

She laughed. “I thought she played very well!” She unbuttoned his collar, and leaned in, kissing the side of his neck.

He cupped her face. She smiled. “You’re a good aunt, Mrs. Shelby,” he said.

She kissed him.

It didn’t take long to get him free of his pants, and to shift up slightly on her knees, and sink onto him, digging her fingers into his shoulders. There was something about the moment that he filled her that she loved, that stole her breath. She closed her eyes, and began to move in time with him, meeting his thrusts, and smiling into his mouth at the feeling.

Tommy swore.

“What?” Grace asked, breathless, and a door slammed shut.

“The housekeeper,” he murmured.

She laughed, and kissed him, and when he bent his head to kiss her neck, she gasped, and stopped thinking altogether.

\---

She was happy. It was the kind of happiness that she knew only from simplistic, soft-edged memories of her childhood. She’d grown to believe that childhood was the keeper of that kind of bright, shining happiness, and it could only exist in memories after childhood, but she was wrong. She felt it now. She was happy. She was happy, and it was better than she remembered from her childhood. It was fuller, and real, and _recognized._

She was _happy_.

\---

The end of the day was her time with Charles. She’d read with him, and sing to him, give him a bath, and put him to bed, and she loved it, loved the warm little world that existed when it was just the two of them. He was a quiet, observant boy, smart, and curious, and full of sweetness.

(She was tempted to ask Polly if Tommy had been that way when he was young, but she wouldn’t give Polly the satisfaction.)

Once in a while, Tommy joined them.

He’d sit in the bathroom with them, and smoke, keeping them company.

Grace had gotten into the habit of taking a bath with Charles, and they’d play in the water; he liked to smack at it with his palms, and he liked when Grace made little waves. “Whoosh,” he’d say, reaching for her hands to get her to make the waves. “Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh.” She’d make the waves, and he’d giggle, and smack at the water in delight. He’d grow tired eventually, and try to cuddle with her, and that meant time for bed.

He was hugging her, and she was about to lift him up, and climb out of the tub, when he began to pee on her.

“Oh!” she shouted, and jerked away from him.

Startled, he burst into tears.

“Charles, no,” she said. “Mama didn’t mean to scare you. You just startled me!”

He made to cuddle into her again, and started to pee again.

She yelped.

He screamed.

“ _Charlie_ ,” she said, and she pulled him to her, rubbing his soft, damp back. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. It’s alright. I didn’t mean to scare you.” He was red in the face, and breathing heavily with tears, and, well, peeing on her.

She looked up, and at Tommy.

His eyes were bright with amusement, and the hook of a smile was pulling on his lips. “How’s that for proof your mama loves you, Charles?” he asked.

\---

They’d know that it was only a matter of time before Churchill got in touch with Tommy, and called in the debt that he felt Tommy owed him. Tommy was grim when he told Grace that he’d heard from Churchill at last. Grace paced the front of the house for hours the evening she waited for Tommy to return from the meeting.

“It’s late, ma’am,” Mary said.

“I know,” Grace said. “I’m fine. I’m going to wait for Mr. Shelby.”

She began to worry when the clock struck midnight, when it struck one in the morning. Had it been a set up? The lateness eventually caught up with her, and she nodded off on the sofa, waiting.

She woke, and was disoriented in a sleepy, unconcerned way for a moment.

It wasn’t until Tommy set her on the bed that she realized he’d carried her up the stairs. “Tommy,” she said, remembering. He was kneeling in front of her, and unfastening the clips of her garters for her.

The room was dark, but he seemed to be unhurt.

“How was it?” she asked.

“Complicated,” he murmured. She could hear the exhaustion in his voice. “It isn’t an assassination he wants.”

She began to unbutton his shirt for him.

“I served my country, Grace,” he said. “I went to war. I fought. And when it was over, I swore I was done with serving my country. I was _done_.”

“You will be again.”

“I don’t know what they’re planning,” he replied, “what they’re using me to do.”

“We’ll find out. You’ll do what they want, but we’ll find out why, and we’ll find a way to ensure that when it’s over, we’ve got all of the cards, and we’ll use them to withdraw you from service to the Crown. Permanently.”

He tipped his head to her chest, hugging her middle.

She bent, and kissed the top of his head.

In the morning, he explained the details of his meeting with Churchill’s man to her. The details were vague. Churchill was expecting the work that he required to be done, but he wasn’t sharing his purposes with Tommy.

It was inevitable that things were going to spiral out of their control, and they did, starting with a threat on their baby’s life.

\---

Tommy had Arthur get Grace, and when she came to the front of the house with him, she found that Tommy had called in all of the servants. They were lined up, maids and cooks and gardeners and butlers. John was there, too, silent, and grim-faced, and Finn. She knew what was going on. Tommy stood behind a chair, and turned to Grace at her arrival, beckoning. The chair was set out for her. She went to him, and sat, looking at the line of servants.

“One of you,” Tommy said, “helped to make a threat on my boy’s life.” His eyes swept over the line of them. “I want to know who.”

Grace knew it wasn’t any of her women from London who’d done it.

That left over a dozen possible people, though.

Tommy began pacing in front of the line, stopping, and staring at people. “I was born to simple means meself,” he said. “I understand. I understand the temptation to make a bit of easy, dirty money when you’re handed the opportunity.” He stared at one of the cooks, who swallowed, and dropped her gaze to the floor.

It wasn’t her, though. Grace was certain. She looked at their faces, at their hands.

“If we don’t find out who it was, we’ll to have punish everybody,” Arthur said. “I don’t think your mistress Shelby would like that.” He clicked his tongue. “No, no, no. I don’t think anyone in here would like that _at all_.”

“Thomas,” Grace said.

He looked at her.

She nodded at one of the maids.

He looked, and seemed to assess the woman. “I think we need to have a talk,” he said, addressing her. “John.” John took a hold of her arm. Her lips went thin, and she was silent, allowing John to steer her from the hall. Her name was Emily. She was young, and dull, or that was what Grade had assumed of her. “The rest of you are going to stay right here until we’re finished,” Tommy said. He touched Grace’s shoulder, passing her, and left.

Arthur stayed, and crossed his arms, glaring at the servants.

Nobody spoke.

“Arthur,” Grace said. “Him, too.” One of the butlers had begun to fidget, would look right at Grace, and look away again as soon as she saw.

“Him?”

She nodded.

“I—” started the butler, and Arthur grabbed the back of his neck, shoving him out of the line. He tried to turn, and Arthur punched him in the stomach. He stumbled, and Finn punched him in the face.

“You wait to talk ‘til I say, you understand?” Arthur demanded. “Get him out of here! Get him to Tommy!”

Finn saw him out of the hall.

Again, it was quiet.

Mr. Paws sauntered into the hall, saw that Grace was sitting, and jumped onto her lip, turning in a circle a couple of times before he settled, and eyed the servants like he, too, was judgeing them.

She pet him.

It was half an hour at least before Tommy returned. There was blood on his shirt. “It’s settled,” he said, looking at Arthur, and at Grace. “The rest of you—” He swept a hand at the servants. “—you’re fired.” Most of them were alarmed, but Tommy seemed oblivious. “Get the fuck out of here,” he said. “Grace.” He jerked his head at her.

She followed him away from the servants.

“It was that butler,” he said. “He was planted by the priest. He’s reported on us to him for months. He used the maid.” He sighed. “He talked her into putting the card in the cot.”

“You haven’t killed him, have you?”

He looked at her.

“We don’t need the priest to have that on you,” she said.

“I know.” He rubbed at his face. “I haven’t killed him, and I won’t.”

“What about Emily?”

“She’s fired.”

“We can’t fire all of them. Houses like this require care. Let’s keep my women from London. They’re loyal. We’ve given them jobs, provided for them, and for their children. They’re loyal, Tommy. Fire the rest. We’ll have your boys work on the grounds when needed, and in the stables.”

“Fine,” he said.

She touched his face, drawing his gaze to her. “We’ll get through this,” she told him. “Do what you must to wash your hands of this priest, and we’ll wash our hands of Churchill with him.” She held his gaze, and he nodded, closing his eyes for a moment, and covering her hands with his own, taking her hands, and kissing her knuckles. They’d get through this.

\---

It was the leader of the Birmingham city council who introduced her to the priest. She was startled, but she put on a smile for him. She didn’t know why she was surprised that he’d have the audacity to come to the dinner even after what he’d done.

“You look quite radiant, Mrs. Shelby,” he said.

“Mrs. Shelby is a _jewel_ of Birmingham, it’s true,” Danny said, beaming.

She laughed.

“I’m eager to hear more about your foundation,” said the priest, ignoring the councilman in favor of Grace, and his smile was practiced, though it failed to hide the assessment in his gaze.

Or did he mean for her to see that he was taking an account of her?

She didn’t know what he expected to discover, or, truthfully, what she wanted him to discover.

Did she pretend not to know that he’d threatened her husband, and threatened her son?

Tommy came up behind Grace, and when he touched her arm, his grip was bruising. His worry was enough to make her decision for her; she turned into him slightly, and played the wife, the innocent. It was better to have the priest underestimate her, and, by extension, Tommy, until they knew exactly whom they were dealing with, and how to cut him at the knees.

“Thomas, this is Father John Hughes,” Grace said. “Father, this is my husband.”

“Yes,” Hughes said.

Tommy was silent; his hold on Grace had tightened.

Danny noticed, and fidgeted in clear, awkward discomfort, clearing his throat. “Danny,” Grace said. “Have you met my sister-in-law, Mrs. Thorne?”

“I haven’t had the pleasure!”

“Excuse us,” Grace said, touching Danny’s hand, and drawing him away from the tension.

She tried to keep her gaze from drifting to Tommy too obviously, but she saw him leave the room with the priest, and with a stranger. She assumed he was in the priest’s economic league organization. She couldn’t think about that right now, though; she needed to focus on the donors, and the dinner.

“You are Mrs. Shelby, aren’t you?” asked a woman.

“I am,” Grace said, smiling.

“Duchess Tatiana Petrovna,” she replied. “I’ve been admiring your sapphire since I arrived, Mrs. Shelby. It is beautiful.”

“It was a gift from my husband.”

“You are spoiled,” Tatiana said. “I believe it is Russian, you know. The jewel.”

“Is that so?” From the corner of her eye, she saw Tommy. “Thomas!” she called, and she drew him to her.

She should have known that Tommy wasn’t going to need to be introduced to the beautiful Russian duchess. His meeting with the priest had rattled him, and he was unable to keep his mouth in check. The fact that he knew the duchess was blatant, and he’d kept it from Grace.

Grace very nearly lost her composure, too, when the duchess began _flirting_ with Tommy.

Who the hell did she think she was?

She was lucky that Ada pulled Grace away.

Tommy caught up with her very soon after, telling her that she was beautiful but needed to take off that necklace.

“Why is that?” Grace asked.

“Please, Grace.”

She batted at his hands.

“ _Grace_."

She allowed him to fumble with the clasp of the necklace. She didn’t know what to make of this, of _him_ ; he wasn’t easily rattled, but he was acting so anxious, was acting so _rattled_ , and it _scared_ her. He pocketed the necklace, and touched her throat, her cheek.

“Who is she?” she asked.

“Who?”

“Thomas."

“She’s no one,” he dismissed, and she pursed her lips.

“I was thinking it was quite the opposite,” she replied. “She’s a duchess. She’s a particularly important someone.”

He clenched his jaw in frustration.

Good.

She was frustrated, too.

“Grace.”

“You’re keeping things from me,” she said. “I know you are.” She lowered her voice, and stepped in closer to him. “There’s a threat on our son’s life, and you’re keeping things from me?” She glared. “I thought that we were in this together. I thought that you _trusted_ me.”

“I do.”

She scoffed.

“I _do_ , Grace. I swear, I do, and I’ll tell you everything. I _need_ you.”

There was a part of her that wanted to believe him, that wanted to think his inability to be truly, completely truthful with her was born of the war, of who he was, of his struggle to be truly, completely truthful with _anyone_. If that were the case, she understood, and she’d be patient with him. But there was a part of her, too, a small, insidious part of her, that believed he couldn’t bring himself to trust _her,_ Grace, the woman who’d broken his heart, and betrayed his trust, and he never really would.

“I _need_ you,” he repeated.

“I don’t want you doing business tonight,” she said, softening. “This is important, Thomas. This foundation is important.”

“I know.”

She raised her eyebrows.

“Business is finished for tonight,” he assured, and touched her chin. “I promise, all right? I promise.”

She nodded.

He searched her gaze for reassurance, and she was helpless to keep from giving it to him. “I’ll tell you everything,” he murmured. “I will.” He kissed her, and she returned it, leaning her forehead on his. “We’re going to finish with this kind of business soon, Mrs. Shelby.”

She touched his cheek. “I know. I love you, Thomas, and I need you, too.” She couldn’t help smiling at him. “I need you, too.”

He kissed her.

It was when she drew away from him that it happened. She started to turn, and take his arm, and she saw the man, saw the gun, saw everything, and was helpless to stop it. Tommy was quicker. He grabbed her, and pulled her behind him at the shout, and the gun went off. In a split-second, the world was changed.

Grace staggered with the weight of her husband, screaming for help.

He was shot.

She sank to her knees, clutching at his shoulders, and holding him to her chest. The stain of blood on his shirt was growing, and she pressed her hands to his chest to try to staunch it. The world had shrunk, and faded, was only him and her, and the distant, violent sounds of his brothers.

 _He was shot_.

The bullet had torn into the middle of him.

“Tommy, you cannot leave me,” she breathed. “I won’t allow it. Tommy, I’m _pregnant_. We’re going to have another baby.” She held his gaze. “I love you, Thomas. You have to hold on. Do you hear me? You have to hold on. I love you.”

He wet his lips. “I hear.” He pressed his hand over her hand.

“I need you,” she told him.

“We have to get him to a hospital,” Ada said, falling to her knees at Grace’s side.

“The ambulance is on the way,” Polly said.

Grace kept a hold of Tommy’s gaze, refusing to allow him to look away from her. She wouldn’t lose his gaze, wouldn’t lose him. “Hold on,” she breathed. “We need you, Thomas.” His blood was slick between her fingers, and panic began choking her, seeing his eyelids grow heavy.

\---

She was there when they’d killed her father. They’d shot him right in the chest, and right in front of her, and she’d toppled to the ground with him in her arms. She’d pressed her hand to the gaping, bleeding hole they’d torn in her daddy, imagining it might be enough to save him.

She had nightmares about it for years.

She’d felt his heart under her palm. She’d looked into her father’s eyes, and seen the anguish in them, and the apology. She’d heard his labored, slowing breaths. She’d held him, and he’d died. She’d known when it was over, because she’d felt his heart stop beating, and she’d screamed, clutching at his chest like she could press the life back in after it had already slipped away. She couldn’t. He’d died, and there were times even years later when she’d press her hand to her chest, feel it beating, and wonder if she wanted it to.

\---

She felt a kind of cold, encompassing calmness overtake her in the hospital. Her husband was shot in the chest, was likely just about to die, and she was standing with his blood staining the front of her gown, listening to Polly yell at doctors who couldn’t do anything, and remembering the shout of the man who’d shot her husband. Tommy had told her about the _disagreement_ with the Italians.

“Lizzie,” she said, looking at where she sat with Esme, Linda, and Ada.

Lizzie’s gaze snapped from Esme.

“These were your Italians, weren’t they?” Grace asked.

“What?”

“Before that man shot my husband, he shouted _for Angel_. Your boyfriend. My husband was shot in the name of your boyfriend.”

“It couldn’t have been him,” Lizzie said, shaking her head. She looked at Esme, at Polly, at John, and her eyes were wide with panic. “I swear, he wouldn’t have done this.”

“John,” Esme said, hesitant.

“Choose,” Grace said, keeping Lizzie pinned with her gaze. “It _was_ your boyfriend, because he wanted an apology from us, and we wouldn’t give it, and when he demanded we give it, we cut him up instead. Choose, Lizzie. Them, or us. I told you once you’d have to make a choice, and the time has come. If you choose them, fine. But you need to get the fuck out of here if that’s the case, because _they shot my husband_.” She glared. “ _Choose_.”

Lizzie didn’t move.

“Good,” Grace said, and she turned to Arthur, John, and Finn.

Her intention must have been obvious, because John nodded, and when Linda stared to speak, Arthur shook his head. “Tommy, Linda,” he murmured. “They shot _Tommy_.” His face was grim, and ready. Grace was ready, too.

\---

Changretta had plenty of men on his payroll, but it wasn’t nearly enough; he should have known that nothing was going to be enough to save him from every fucking copper, soldier, drunk, and gambler in the employ of the Peaky fucking Blinders. They stormed the house. There was a woman screaming loudly, and Isaiah was shooting the walls, shattering the mirrors, the vases, the lamps, and Grace was watching with hatred like a latticework in her lungs, making it burn to breathe.

They got Angel first; Arthur smacked him across the face with his gun, and began to beat him.

Scudboat dragged Vicente to the front of the house, and to Grace.

He was dressed in pajamas.

His gaze darted from where his son was curled on the ground while Arthur, Finn, and Isaiah beat him, to John’s cold, barely controlled anger, to where Grace stood in front of him.

“Did you think you could kill the king, and the kingdom would crumble?” she asked.

“I—”

John pointed his revolver, and, without even looking, shot Vicente’s son.

Grace held her hand out, and Michael gave her a gun. She cocked it, pressing the muzzle to Vicente’s forehead. He swallowed, and closed his eyes.

\---

(She hadn’t ever forgotten what her uncle Henry had told her. “This world isn’t meant for the sweet and  softhearted,” he’d told her, shaking his head. It hadn’t meant much to her when she was a girl, had to her simply been the suggestion that her mother was lovely in life, and missed in death.

It implied more when she was older, because wasn’t that what women were _expected_ to be?

Didn’t men see the flaw in their design?

How could they demand that women be soft, then tell them the world wasn’t meant for softness?)

\---

She returned to the hospital while the boys burned the house, needing to know Tommy’s fate.

Polly was waiting. She rose to her feet at the sight of Grace, and the question was in her gaze. “It’s done,” Grace murmured. She thought of Charles at home, sleeping safely without any idea that he might never, ever see his father again. She swallowed, and Polly touched her arm.

“He’s going to live,” Polly said.

Grace couldn’t do anything but stare, fearing the truth.

“They said it missed his heart, and his lungs, and was caught in—in muscle. They got it out, and sewed him up. He lost a lot of blood, and they’ll have to watch for infection, but—”

“He’s going to live?”

“Yes.”

It sunned her when Polly hugged her.

“They need us,” Polly whispered. “They don’t know it, but they need us. It’s _us_ that have to keep this family together, Grace.”

Slowly, she raised her arms, and clutched Polly’s shoulders, hugging her.

She was tearing up when they drew apart.

Polly wiped at Grace’s cheeks. “Go on,” she said. “See after him. I’ll leave Curly with you. I’ll go to your house, and see after Charles. I’ll bring him by in the morning, alright?” She squeezed Grace’s arm.

“Finn can drive you,” Grace said.

She went into Tommy’s room, pausing for a moment at the sight of him.

His face was drained of color.

He was going to live, though. It had missed his heart. He was going to live through this.

She sat on the edge of the bed, and touched his cheek, feeling the warmth of life in him despite the pallor of his face, his stillness, the crisscross of bandages that covered his chest.

She was in Arthur’s coat, and she patted at the pockets until she found a pack. There was a lighter, too. She lit a cigarette for herself, breathing in deeply, and out, trying to relax her thudding, panicked heart. It was over. Changretta was dead, and Tommy was going to survive. She looked at Tommy, and took his hand, rubbing her thumb over his fingers. She’d sworn after her father’s death that she’d never _need_ anyone again. Because if she did, she might lose them. She couldn’t take another loss. She didn’t know what she would have possibly done if she’d lost Tommy.

His eyes were open.

“Tommy?” she breathed, and she teared up again, seeing that he was awake. “Here.” She held the cigarette to his lips, slipping her hand behind his neck to help him. He took a drag. “We took care of Changretta,” she told him, stroking his hair.

He opened his mouth, and closed it, licking his lips.

“Oh,” Grace said, turning in search of a glass. “I—” She looked at him. “I’ll get you a glass of water.”

He clutched her arm, stopping her.

“You’re going to be fine,” she assured. “I promise. The doctors say you’ll be fine.”

He muttered. She grasped his hand. He swallowed, and spoke again. “The baby,” he said. His gaze went to her torso. She was still in her dress for the dinner, and it was dashed in Tommy’s blood.

“Fine,” Grace said. She smiled. “Now that he knows his father is going to survive, the baby is fine.”

“How do you know it’s a boy?” he murmured.

“I don’t.” She touched the back of his hand to her belly. “Shall we have a girl, Tommy?”

“If this one isn’t a girl, we’ll try again.”

She laughed, and lifted his hand to press it to her face, kissing his fingers “Rest,” she murmured, and she leaned in, kissing him on the lips. “I’ll get you a glass of water, then you need to rest. We’ve got to get you on your feet again.” She touched his cheek, and his neck, feeling his pulse. It was strong, and steady. Certain. “We’ve only just got started, Tommy.”

**fin.**

_Oh, dear, never saw you coming,_  
_Oh, my, look what you have done._  
_You're my favorite song,_  
_Always on the tip of my tongue._

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, here is what I was thinking with this fic.
> 
> I like the idea that s1!Grace had been raised with a view of the world that's black and white, good and evil, and she was certain about it, only to have it challenged by the events of s1. I would have liked to see a s2!Grace who was living by her own, much grayer code of ethics as a result, and whose ideas of morality were continuing to form while she figured out who she was. That would have opened it up for a s3!Grace who once again had a firm view of the world, and once again it was black and white, but this time it was us versus them, and, tada, we would have had a Grace who was worthy mob wife material, and who would have been fascinating to watch on TV. Alas.


End file.
